author
Lewis Tappan
1788–1873
A driven New York merchant turned one of the early public voices against slavery, he helped rally support for the Africans of the Amistad and pushed antislavery work into national debate. His life also reached into business history through the founding of a pioneering credit-reporting agency.
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About the author
Born in Northampton, Massachusetts, in 1788, Lewis Tappan became a successful merchant in New York before devoting much of his energy to reform. He was raised in a Calvinist family, and that moral seriousness shaped his work in causes he believed demanded public action.
Tappan is best remembered as a leading American abolitionist. He helped build antislavery organizations, supported abolitionist publishing and activism, and played an important role in winning public sympathy and legal support for the captive Africans from the Amistad in 1839–1841.
His career also left a mark outside reform. He helped found the New York Journal of Commerce and later established the Mercantile Agency, an early credit-reporting business that became part of Dun & Bradstreet. He died in 1873, remembered both for his activism and for his influence on American commerce.